Chapter 38: Sisters
Content Note: Graphic violence in this chapter.
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The brush grew thicker as Kay sprinted through the woods. She tried to ignore the sticks and thorns tearing at her bare skin, but she stumbled and nearly fell when something caught on her shorts. She scanned the trees ahead for any sign of Nadia, but saw nothing.
A screech reverberated through the woods, and she caught a glimmer of movement beyond the branches and bushes. Two figures darted into view, but at the distance Kay was at, she couldn’t tell which one was which.
She could tell, though, that a massive, ivory shape moved beyond them, and she could only hope that it was preoccupied with something else – or was on Nadia’s side to begin with.
The two figures wove and danced about each other, as if fighting hand-to-hand. It was possible they were out of spell ingredients. Kay ducked down in the bushes, trying to weigh her options, but not wanting to wait too long.
She had a tiny bit of strength left for a shield, and enough for another small burst of fire – if that. Even with her limited magic-sensing abilities, the vials in her pocket felt as dead as dry leaves.
Her best chance was to try to snipe Nina, if she was even there, and if she would hold still for long enough. Kay peeked through the bushes and saw Nadia’s shirt and shorts visible on the figure on the left. The figure she was fighting was likely Nina, but even if it wasn’t, it was someone worth sniping.
She waited several seconds, hoping they would draw closer and give her a better shot. When they didn’t, she sucked in a breath, raised her head and shoulders just above the top of the bush, and took aim with shaking fingers. A burst of fire, much smaller than usual, flew across the field, closing the distance between herself and the figures before they could even react.
Her heart dropped as the fireball drew far, far closer to Nadia than she had intended. Nadia shrieked and fell backward, her face and arm already a murderous, blistering shade of red. The woman on the right, Nina, leapt back as well, but turned her attention to Kay without missing a beat.
“Nadia? Nadia!” Kay yelled, running closer.
Nina’s face contorted as her eyes darted about the scene. For a moment, Kay wasn’t sure what she was looking for, but she soon remembered the demon lurking in the woods nearby. Nina broke into a sprint, her right arm drawn back to strike as she rushed at Kay.
She was clearly out of spell power – or was bluffing to draw Kay in close. Either way, Kay didn’t have a choice. She had never been trained in hand-to-hand combat, but the self-defense courses she took in high school could at least buy some time as she waited for a chance to pounce.
She stepped to the right and deflected Nina’s punch with a raised arm. Nina pivoted and brought up her left fist, but the uppercut was weak, and Kay blocked it as well.
At first glance, Nina appeared to have no knives or other weapons on her, but Kay knew she could easily be hiding another trick. She hesitated, and Nina seized the opportunity by bringing a knee up into Kay’s stomach.
The next thing Kay knew, her head was hitting the ground with a heavy thud. Stars burst before her eyes, but the pain in her head was nothing compared to the agony where Nina’s knee had hit her. Before she could struggle to her feet, she heard Nina growl somewhere above her.
There was a scream and a much softer thud, and when Kay looked up, Nina was rubbing the side of her head and cursing. Several feet away, Nadia sat upright, seeming oblivious to the burns covering her face and torso.
“Still here, bitch!” Nadia yelled.
Behind Kay, something let out an unearthly shriek, and Nina’s eyes widened. Kay resisted the urge to turn around. Whatever was happening, it was bad for Nina; it was obvious in the panic in her eyes.
It was the first time Kay had ever seen her scared.
And Nadia was smiling – though it didn’t quite seem to reach her eyes. Kay could only guess that something she summoned had done something good.
Nina turned her attention back to Nadia, and Kay began to quietly haul herself to her feet. She could see Nadia’s lips moving, but she doubted Nadia had any strength left. If she did, it wouldn’t be enough to hold off a murderous rampage by Nina.
Every muscle in Kay’s body seemed to fight her, but she forced herself to charge at Nina, praying that her momentum would be enough to do some damage. Nina seemed to sense the danger and turned around again, raising her arms as if prepared to simply block the force of Kay’s attack.
At the last possible moment, Kay ducked and brought her elbow up and into Nina’s ribs. There was a soft, sickening crunch as something gave way inside Nina. There was a cry of pain – or frustration, or fear; Kay couldn’t tell whether herself or Nina had made the noise – and the two fell to the ground with Kay sprawled on top of Nina.
Nina reached down and tried to grab a fistfull of Kay’s hair, but Kay shoved her hand away and scrambled halfway upright before planting her knees on top of Nina’s upper arms. For a moment, she thought she would lose her balance as Nina struggled beneath her, and she realized she had no time to spare. Their screams intermingled before Nadia’s cut through both of them: “Kay!”
Kay summoned the last of her strength; if she lost here, she and Nadia were both as good as dead. Nina bucked again, and the pain in Kay’s stomach almost overwhelmed her determination to stay upright.
She lurched forward and planted her hands around Nina’s throat. Nina’s fingernails clawed at the knees that held her to the ground, and Kay closed her eyes, wanting to shut out the things she was about to see and hear.
She wished Nadia would call out some sort of reassurance – some kind of affirmation for what Kay was doing – but it never came.
The woods grew quiet as Nina stopped moving. She could sense that the life in the body beneath her had vanished. A splinter of remorse pierced the fog of adrenaline clouding her mind, but it was quickly obscured by fear. Nina had dabbled in necromancy. Surely she had another trick up her sleeve.
She forced herself to open her eyes halfway and see if Nina was really dead. The face before her confirmed her suspicions. She pulled her hands away and scrambled away, wiping her hands on the grass as if to clean her fingers of the violence they had just incurred.
She jumped at a sudden voice behind her: “Kay. Kay!”
She looked over her shoulder as she realized it was Nadia, who had slumped back against the ground. “Nadia, you okay?” Kay asked, her voice shaking. “Is that demon gone?”
The burns on Nadia’s face were shiny and raw, but she nodded. “ Yeah, Nina’s is gone, so we’re safe for now. I’m exhausted, that’s all,” she said. “And I fell pretty hard, though that rock I landed on came in handy, huh?”
Kay struggled to her feet and limped over to Nadia. She had fallen hard on her left knee while tackling Nina, and she was intensely grateful there was no one else left to fight. She knew she couldn’t have held up any longer. Nadia was in even worse shape; while the burns on her face would heal, her right arm was charred from shoulder to elbow.
“Let’s get you some medical help,” she said as she sat down hard next to Nadia.
“I’m okay. Haven’t had time for healing, so I have ingredients left for that,” Nadia murmured, reaching her bloodied left hand up to Kay’s face. “You’re in bad shape too.”
Kay pulled away as she felt faint magic radiating from Nadia’s hand. Every inch of her body ached, but she shook her head. “Don’t,” she said, placing a hand over Nadia’s hand and lowering it.
“You’re bleeding, though, and you probably have a concussion.”
“And I burned you! You have to—”
“I was about to die. I thought I was about to die at her hands, or her demon’s, if mine would’ve lost.”
There were no tears in Nadia’s eyes, no pain in her face, and no tension in her body. She lay in the grass with a smile playing at her lips, despite the burns covering the right side of her body
.
There was something wet on Kay’s face, but she had no idea whether it was blood or tears. “You have to heal yourself,” she mumbled. Her lips didn’t want to work; the adrenaline that had fueled her earlier was gone.
“Not right now. Please, Kay.”
“I’ll go get the rest of Maywitch—”
“Stay,” Nadia said, her tone bordering on pleading. “We don’t know who else is out there. Let Maywitch come here.”
There was no one else out there, Kay knew. The sound of fighting had faded completely, aside from a dull, distant helicopter or two. She wanted to run away – to get help – even if it meant running straight into the arms that would soon arrest and punish her. It was irrational, even if it partly came from a desire to help Nadia; after all, Nadia wasn’t that gravely wounded.
Kay just didn’t want to be anywhere near Nina’s body, she realized with a shudder.
Nadia’s eyes, though, were unwavering, and as Kay met her gaze again, she knew she had to stay. She nodded and gripped Nadia’s hand tightly. “Thank you,” she murmured as Nadia smiled.
“Holly is fifty feet or so back east,” Nadia said. “I can still sense her, so I’m sure she’s still alive. She took out Kyle with the last of her strength.”
“Good for her. And you’re sure Kyle’s dead?”
“Yes.” Nadia winced, and for a moment, Kay considered asking her to focus on healing herself again. “Make sure they help her first. If I could get over there myself…”
She trailed off, and Kay nodded. “Once I catch my breath, I’ll take you over there,” Kay said. “She needs it more than I do—”
“Don’t bother. Maywitch is almost here now, actually. Make sure to warn them that one of my demons is still lurking somewhere to the west, will you?”
Kay whipped her head around to face east. Dark-clad figures strode through the underbrush; their riot helmets obscured their identities, but Kay guessed they couldn’t be anyone other than Maywitch or cops. One of the figures flipped up his helmet visor, and Kay recognized him as one of the law enforcement liaisons she had seen around the North Carolina base. She heard a noise, and she glanced back to see an olive-colored truck plowing over a thinner patch of brush nearby.
The law enforcement liaison waved. “Adamis, who’s that with you?” he yelled.
“Nadia’s here. Nina’s dead. Holly should be over by you – check on her!” Kay replied.
Two more dark-clad men rushed toward a spot a short distance away, and she hoped that they had spotted Holly. Nadia sighed, her breath coming out ragged and pained, and reached for Kay’s arm. “Listen,” Nadia murmured, “seek Tierra’s advice on what to do next. She’ll figure out what’s best for the three of you—”
“What about you, though? What do I need to do to keep them from – from locking you up, or something? Do you think they’ll do that?” Kay said, glancing up at the approaching figures.
“There’s nothing you can do about that. They’re going to do what they’re going to do no matter what.”
“No they won’t!”
Nadia smiled, and Kay could feel her eyes welling up with tears. A soft crunch nearby alerted her to the presence of three armed men, all wearing the dark-clad fatigues of the rest of the group surrounding them. One of them lunged forward and grabbed Kay’s arm. “Let go!” Kay barked, twisting her arm and yanking herself away.
“Go with them, Kay. Trust me, okay?” Nadia said, running her hand up Kay’s other arm.
“If you resist, there will be consequences. Let’s move!” a voice boomed nearby.
A second man grabbed Kay’s other arm, and she stumbled to her feet. “Fine!” she hissed. “But where are you taking her?”
“You’re both going back to the base. Get in the truck.”
Kay whirled around, straining against the taller man’s grip. “But—”
“I’m fine, Kay,” Nadia said. “We’ll be safer at the base, anyway.”
“No you won’t!”
Nadia’s eyes widened, but before Kay could say anything else, the man yanked her away. She stumbled over a root as she tried to turn to catch a glimpse of Nadia again. The voices around her grew louder, but before she was pulled too far away, she heard Nadia say: “I won’t resist… unless you try to hurt me.”
The man holding Kay’s arm mumbled something to someone nearby and brought her to a sudden halt. George DeMason stood a few feet away, walkie-talkie in one hand and cell phone in the other. He looked Kay over and sighed.
“Don’t cause any more trouble for us, and you won’t get any more trouble,” he said, placing undue emphasis on the last phrase. “The Board is handling the situation. Your fate is up to them. If it were solely up to me…”
He trailed off, his eyes darkening. Kay twisted to catch sight of Nadia again, but she had disappeared into the growing crowd of people.
Her stomach somersaulted as she realized that he had probably come after them to take out Nina by any means necessary – including his lightning powers. Kay had killed her in the nick of time. She glared at him, struggling to keep her voice from shaking as she asked: “Where's my mother and Wojtec?”
“They’re already being loaded into a helicopter. They’ll survive. Now get in the truck.”
She felt a tiny surge of pride well up inside her as she met his eyes. They had survived and managed to protect the Grimoire. They had accomplished more than he ever could have with his reckless plan.
She – and Nadia, and Holly, and even Tierra – had won.
But at what cost?